Someone asked if The Wee Cookbook I posted had soda beer bread recipes with no raisins. I don’t think any of these quite fit the bill, but thought I’d share anyways in case they would work! There’s a couple from The Wee Cookbook (undated, but guessing 1980s based on Google) and one from The Rhyming Irish Cookbook (1992).
by Flashy_Employee_5341
6 Comments
*Image Transcription: Book Pages*
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#THE *Rhyming* IRISH COOKBOOK
GORDON SNELL
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#SODA BREAD
1 lb/454 g 4 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon/4 g salt
1 teaspoon/4 g baking soda
½ pint/284 ml/1¼ cups buttermilk or sour milk
Oven setting: Gas mark 7 : 220°C : 425°F
Generations have been fed
This celebrated Irish bread,
And you’ll find when once you bake it,
That it isn’t hard to make it.
First you take the flour and sieve it,
Then a thorough mixing give it,
With the salt and soda too.
Now the buttermilk is due:
Pour it over, nice and slow,
And stir to make a soft, smooth dough.
Put this, after kneading lightly,
On a board you’ve floured slightly.
Shape it round — and as for height,
Four centimetres should be right.
To make it in the Irish way
Place it on a baking tray,
Take a knife and cut half through it —
Cross-wise is the way to do it.
Forty minutes baking should
Make Soda Bread that’s really good.
You’ll be in the best of form
If you eat it fresh and warm.
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#THE WEE COOKBOOK
RECIPES WERE CONTRIBUTED BY IRISH CHILDREN’S FUND FAMILY AND FRIENDS
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#WHEATON BREAD
2 c whole wheat flour
¾ c unbleached flour
¼ c wheat germ or bran
2 T butter
1 t sugar
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
¼ t cream of tartar
½ pint buttermilk
Mix all ingredients together. Rub in butter & mix in enough buttermilk to make a soft kneading consistency. Bake in an oiled, floured loaf tin at 350 for 40-45 min.
Emer Torpey
Dalkey, Co. Dublin
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#IRISH SODA BREAD
3 c flour
⅔ c sugar
1 T baking powder
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
1½ c raisins
2 beaten eggs
1¾ c buttermilk
2 T melted butter
Sift dry ingredients, stir in raisins. Combine eggs, buttermilk & melted butter. Stir all ingredients by hand till well mixed. Grease 2 9″ loaf pans or 1 lg. loaf pan. Pour in batter & bake at 350 for 1 hr. Remove from pan & cool.
Loni Kelly
South Holland
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#MAUREEN’S SODA BREAD with CARAWAY SEEDS
2 c flour
2 T sugar
2 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
½ t salt
½ c raisins
1 T caraway seeds
1 c buttermilk
3 T butter
Sift dry ingredients, add raisins & seeds. Cut in butter with hands till mixture crumbly. Add buttermilk & stir quickly with fork just till moistened. Gather up & lightly knead on floured surface for 1 min. Do not work too much. Shape into a ball & place on a greased cookie sheet. Flatten into a 7″ circle. With a floured knife cut a cross into the top. Bake at 375 for 30-40 min. or until loaf sounds hollow when tapped. Brush with melted butter if desired.
Diane O’Connor
Downers Grove
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#IRISH SODA FARLS
Sift ½ # of plain flour, add a level t of baking soda, ¼ t salt & stir in a ¼ pint of buttermilk or sour milk. Mix till the dough is soft. Knead very lightly. Turn out onto a floured board & shape into a round about ½” thick. Cut into quarters. Bake on a floured griddle for 10-15 min.
Agnes Limacher & Susan Jary
Joliet
For anyone having trouble getting a soda bread to turn out light or non rubberized, watch a Darina Allen video on YouTube where she explains using a light hand and her “claw” method of mixing.
Rubbing in the butter to peas sized pieces? The goal isn’t have every grain of flour evenly coated in butter and then it comes together in pea sized pieces- if you want light/flakey scones or soda bread you work it until the butter is just broken down to pea sized pieces. Starting with grated butter will speed the process.
Big difference in texture between stirring in melted butter(tends to be tough)/working in cold to pea sized(lighter/ flakey)/ fully pulverized (finer tighter crumb like some tea cakes). So many old recipes assume you’ve seen it done a million times “mix.” Handle that dough quickly and lightly (but not timidly-get in and get out) like you are afraid to awaken the beast!
Any brown bread recipes?
Does the rhyming one happen to have a cheesecake recipe? I have a rhyming cheesecake recipe from my partners family and they don’t know the origin of it
I’ve never heard of rhyming recipes! It’s crazy but I love it! Now I want one!
Thanks for posting these! Still close enough and I will experiment to see what I come up with.